Azalea rants

Adrian Higgins boldly claimed this week that azaleas are overdone, that people plant them regardless of color schemes and prune them into horrible balls. He's right, of course, at least a little. Sure, they're overdone in Washington, and in many gardens they are the only plants you see. But they make beautiful cut flowers, and planted right - in naturalistic settings, in shade - they can be beautiful.

My house came with a few azaleas in front that have grown over the last twenty years into an imposing presence. Okay, I would not have chosen this color (especially since it clashes with the coral bells, also in bloom now), but for two weeks a year I can live with it and even like it.

 

But take it out entirely? Higgins suggests such a thing, but I don't think I'm brave enough - or motivated enough. Even though it would open up another three or four feet at the back of the garden.

Meanwhile, the white azaleas in back are blooming now and looking quite elegant. This is the one I transplanted twice, and it seems happy here against the fence.

 

Yes, to most eyes it would appear etiolated and wee, but I prefer to see it as a Zen azalea. Less is more.

The hikers take a walk

Four of the five hiking girls met at the National Arboretum last month for a stroll around the grounds. It had been years and years since I was there, and it's definitely worth a trip. It starts at the water gardens by the entrance.
 

 

The Asian gardens had perhaps the best use of bamboo I've seen.


I made several Notes to Self.
 
This was a delicious combination of ginger and Hosta 'Halcyon.'

 
Kirengeshoma will get pretty big - I'm glad I have it under the oak tree instead of in the front garden.

 

I don't know Hexastylis, but it looks perfect for the shade gardens.

 
This plumleaf azalea is a native - worth looking into.
 

I loved the larkspur blooming among the balloonflower (though mine are just now coming into bud, so the timing might not work - nevertheless, get some larkspurs!)


There were a couple mysteries, too. What is this plant? The fruit left a heavy coating of orange pollen on my fingers.
 

 

And this is something ordinary, I think, but what? Elderberry??

More pix online here. Note the gorgeous lilies, poppies and larkspur by the Herb Garden. Delicious!

Rip it out

Along with the dogwood, the less attractive pink azalea is now gone, too, revealing the downspout tucked behind it and making the view down the pathway clearer. At the moment the plan is to plant poor 'Zepherine Drouhin,' who's been moved around the garden for the last month, in place of the azalea, bordered by the three bearberries I bought from the Tri-City people last month.  
 

I'm not sure the scale is right, with the azalea overbalanced on the left side of the steps, but we'll see. Also worried that the rose won't get enough sun, but again, time will tell.

Upcoming projects

It's time to prune the pink azalea drastically in preparation for getting it out of the ground and putting it - where? Maybe somewhere in the back where I can enjoy its color but don't have to pay too much attention to it. And in its place? The 'Zepherine Drouhin' rose that I've been agonizing about and finally bought at Roxbury on Friday afternoon. I think it gets enough sun there, especially in the morning, and it's worth a try. Not sure whether it needs any support, but since I don't have $1000 to spend on this gorgeous structure, maybe it can do without it.



It's also past time to prune all of the boxwoods, which I suddenly realize have grown all out of proportion to their sites.

The honeysuckle is in full bloom and its sweet, haunting fragrance has hypnotized me into thinking I should never cut it back. I will come to my senses once the flowers fade.

Catching up

June is just a blur, which is too bad because so much happened in the garden. Here's an attempt to catch up just a bit.

Lots of rain and mostly cool temperatures made for a beautiful spring. Favorites include allium triquetrum, which lasted and lasted along the walkway;
the seedpods of the baptisia;

the always-reliable clematis that Betsy gave me twenty years ago as a housewarming present;
and the absolutely gorgeous peonies that threw bloom after bloom this year. The clump's gotten quite big, it might be time to move some of the daylilies, as I keep threatening to do.

This year the rhododendron was incredibly floriferous and was really beautiful for the first time ever (this is an inherited plant that fills up some space quite nicely though I might not have sought it out myself). No pix, just imagine it. Then I finally caught up to Adrian Higgins' article in the Post that notes this is the "best spring ever" for azaleas and rhododendrons, thanks to last year's drought. Apparently, too much moisture promotes leaf growth over flowers - who knew?

May in the garden

So much has been happening over the last few weeks. Lots of rain and very cool weather has made flowers last. The Delaware Valley azalea bloomed early for some reason - it's usually a welcome surprise in June but it's been in bloom for about a week already. The clematis that Betsy gave me when I moved in is blooming by the mailbox. Several kinds of iris - I think they're Japanese iris but maybe they're Siberian? - are in bloom or even just gone by. A pale creamy white one, and a striking yellow are just going by.

Best of all is the Sarah Bernhardt peony. This is probably its fourth year, and it's just going to town. Big flowers with hundreds of petals, pale pink streaked with darker pink, a pungent scent, and when the flowers start to fade, you can cup them in your hands and feel the silky soft petals fall into your palm.

And then there's the foxglove, and the tiarella is still in bloom, and the sunny garden is a sea of blue with catmint, amsonia, sage, the ends of columbine... Never go away in May again, it's too wonderful to leave!

Levittown, a project, Delaware Valley

A brand new garden reminds me of Levittown, everything bare and new and not very attractive. My own Levittown is the new back garden, which now sports two rhododendrons, a hosta 'Blue Umbrella,' a red epimedium and wild ginger which I think are getting too much sun there, and the white azalea that I finally moved from the front garden. (And when I say "I," I mean that after lots of digging I decided that this is the only azalea that's not shallow-rooted and had to bring in Will to help me pry it loose. It may or may not live, we'll see.)

Sara Toye had some hostas to give away, so I planted them in the oak tree garden. Here they are looking very puny and new along with the Green Dragon plant from Lin, a transplanted hellebore, and a transplanted astilbe that was desperately trying to grow under the big, healthy white tradescantia in the top left of the picture.

Will also helped me to install the rain barrel from the Friends of the Rappahannock.

Not beautiful, but it will look better once I get some shrubs to soften up that corner. Now I want it to rain more than ever.

The Delaware Valley white azalea is a classic, always blooming in June and very satisfactory. However, I'm not sure that the three white azaleas I have here still work - they've gotten a bit too big for the space. Maybe I'll ask some new eyes to look at this and decide whether to prune, transplant, or leave them alone.

Henry Mitchell would be proud

The late, lamented garden writer for the Post used to encourage people to plant the most outrageously brilliant azaleas if they liked and let good taste go hang. I can't track down the exact quote, but in "The Essential Earthman" he does say,

"I have a shocking patch of azaleas, fortunately not very large, of pink, three shades of red, and a couple of whites. I like them, but they are dangeroulsy close to grossness... I knew it was wrong to add two or three yellow-orange-salmon-tawny deciduous azaleas across the walk from the reds and pinks..."

My contribution to grossness in azaleas is this enormous clump under the living room windows, which came with the house and goes on without fail despite my almost total lack of care for it. It's not really fair to call it gross, I guess, it's just very intense. And though it might not have been my choice to begin with, I have come to enjoy its lushness.

What's in bloom today

Another cool week, so the tulips are lasting and lasting. This picture was meant to show how the Corps de Ballet tulip mix from WFF included some orange tulips that really didn't work, but as a bonus you can see that the white water pipe doesn't work, either!

A nor'easter promised for tonight and tomorrow, and we do need the rain. At the moment, the azaleas are starting to come out,

and the Solomon's Seal is slowly emerging from the leaf litter.